Ask 411 Wrestling 09.16.09: Swapping Companies, Future Main Eventers, and No Respect for Managers!

Posted by Mathew Sforcina on 09.16.2009

Is HHH's brother DX's singer? Was Tod Gordon really a mole? Did Taker really have to threaten Shawn Michaels? Who went the longest before a turn? Where did a bunch of questions from last week go? All this, plus the birth of Chet Lemon, plus I pinpoint the exact point Vince McMahon was acknowledged as being owner of the WWF. And it's not the one you think.

Hello, and welcome to the Jeremy Borash Approved Ask 411 Wrestling!*

* = Approved in that JB liked my 2 minute match at the TNA tryouts, or at least pretended to like it to get rid of me. JB has in all probability never read, seen or even heard of this column even if he used to post here on 411, kinda.

Gee, seems like it's been a while since I sat down to do one of these things.

Oh yeah, it has been!

Big ups or whatever the term is to Ryan for filling in for me last week. I ended up being in an ok frame of mind, but I did enjoy my week off.

Now to half ass this so I can get back to Arkham Asylum!

Backtalking

Will not be seen this week given the delay/me not writing last week's column. Instead I offer some Interesting Royal Rumble Winner stats, as provided by cheap filler material producer Appreciated Ask 411 Friend, Sage Freehaven. If you ever wanted statistical proof that Austin is 10 times the man Vince is, there it is. But thanks to those who wrote in about the various things (like how the net thing was probably from the Dognapping angle).

Your Turn, Smart Guy…

The last question was:
Who Am I? A former Intercontinental Champion, I'm known more for my backstage issues and controversy than my in ring work. I've been a world champion (although you can debate if it's really a world title) 2 times, although the belt in question I held more times than that. I've teamed with some of the best in the business, Steamboat, Dreamer, Malenko, Wilson. One of my final acts in the company where I achieved my greatest success (the first time around) was to unleash a referee onto the company. I am fairly easy to guess, I Am Who?

He's the guy in this image.

*waits for jokes about "Which One?" and such*

OK, so maybe the Riddler's rubbed off on me a little, I have a slightly esoteric idea here.

There are 9 WWE titles currently active. Ignoring the Women's belts for the moment, which of the following companies can claim that their alumni have held every WWE title? Note that the person involved has to have held a WWE title AFTER being in that company. So WCW can claim Booker T, but not TNA.

WCW
ECW (Original)
TNA
ROH
AWA
OVW

And, as a bonus, if any of these companies can answer yes, can they also claim the full sweep with the Women's Titles as well?

Questions, Questions, Who's Got The Questions?

Well, let's get on with it. First up…

Wait, what's this?

Hmm, turns out Ryan was a little too wordy last week, and had to cut out a whole bunch of questions. Well, waste not want not! If you read last week's column in the hour or so this was in it, skip ahead to the picture of Hot Current Trish.

I have no idea who wrote this first question, it wasn't in the mail.

I recently watched the greatly anticipated, yet completely underwhelming Edge vs. Matt Hardy from Summerslam 2005.

This was the initial match of what was supposed to be a long rivalry between the two, based on the real-life cheating between Edge and Lita.

I found the match completely anticlimactic with just a bunch of punching, both guys getting winded quickly, and then Matt getting knocked out by the ringpost. Edge looked pleasantly surprised at winning the match by knock out.

You'd think anything that makes it on camera is a work, yet the match was crap by pro wrestling standards and made Hardy look so weak I have a hard time believing he'd go for it. I mean Edge takes his woman, arguably his spot, and beats the crap out of him so bad with standard kicks and punches Hardy can't continue? How can you respect/get behind a character like that?

It does look like Hardy takes the bump wrong (does not get his hands up in time) and is unfit to continue (blood's probably a blade job yet his eyes are glassed over and his coordination is off), but the ending just makes him look so weak. If he was legit injured and Edge is supposed to win anyway, you would think Edge would get orders from the back to throw on a submission hold so Matt could retain some of his pride.

So two questions:
1) Are there any legit rumors that at least part of the match was a shoot?

2) If not, why do you think the WWE went out of their way to make Hardy look so weak?

The match was completely, 110% without any doubt in my mind or in the mind of anybody else that I know a complete and utter WORK. No portion of it whatsoever was a legitimate fight between the two men. Granted, the Edge and Hardy were working a different, slightly more realistic style than what you are used to seeing on WWE television, and that was probably because they wanted to try to put some doubt in to people's minds as to whether the match was worked or not.

As far as why the match makes Hardy look so "weak" is concerned, Matt himself actually addressed this issue in some blog entries he posted not long after the match happened. He claimed that the way the bout was done would fit in to the structure of a larger story and that it would all make sense as the story unfolded. I would imagine that he honestly believed that as he was defending the match, but, for whatever reason, the storyline that Hardy was playing out in his head never came to unfold on WWE television.

The Hitcher wants to ask a question about one of the greatest wrestling theme songs ever recorded.

Did I make this up in my head or did The Quebecers come out to The Mounties' theme for a while? Except from my memory this version started with "We're NOT The Mounties, we're handsome, we're brave, we're strong…." If so, that's some funny shizzle and I've just won a WWF Retro Ice Cream circa 1990 that's been in my friend's freezer for nearly TWENTY YEARS. If not, I've gotta go toss me some salad. Ciao!

Well, get ready to take that ice cream bar home, because the Quebecers absolutely did enter to the Mounties' theme, complete with the slight alteration of lyrics that you mentioned in your question. For those of you who may not be aware, Jacques of the Quebecers was Jacques Rougeau, the same man who played the Mountie character a few years earlier in the WWF.

Roman asks one of the many questions that we are getting in which has been inspired by the release of WWE's Rise and Fall of WCW DVD.

I recently picked up the Rise and Fall of WCW DVD and there was one incident in particular that I remember vaguely and this DVD brought it back. At Bash at the Beach '00, Hogan was coming back and was supposed to win the belt off of Jarrett. Well, I guess he was supposed to lose, but didn't want to blah blah blah. I'm sure you're familiar with the whole ordeal and Russo ordering Jeff to lie down for Hogan, then Hogan going off on Russo and Russo going off on Hogan. Was this all a work? A shoot? A combination of two? I've looked into this further and couldn't find a definite answer.

It was a combination of the two. The majority of what happened on the screen was planned. Jarrett refusing to work the match, laying down, and getting pinned by Hogan was all planned in advance and every party involved – including Hogan – was fully aware of what was going to happen. It was also planned in advance that Vince Russo would come out afterwards, cut a promo on the Hulkster, and order a match between Jarrett and Booker T. for the "real" WCW Title.

However, things departed from the plan somewhat, at least according to Hogan. He claims that, even though it was understood that Vinny Ru would cut a promo on him, Russo went over the line with his remarks and ridiculed the legendary wrestler in manners that were not agreed upon. This even resulted in Hogan filing a defamation lawsuit against WCW and Russo, though the case was dismissed in 2002 without ever going to trial.

Daniel F. Wells cops an Attitude Era:

I remember in 1997 a recurring IWC rumor regarding Raw was that Shawn Michaels was trying to do things to get himself fired so as to go to WCW. In watching Shawn in 1997, as a face, tweener, and heel . . . you almost get the sense he was going over the top. Now, it could be the old addage "if it's on TV, it's scripted" and Shawn was doing some great worked-shoots, or it could be Shawn just had lots of freedom to be edgy. Just wondering about this whole time period and if Shawn was trying to get fired in making references to his "friends down south," the replaying of the MSG Cliq goodbye, references to McMahon as boss, cheap shots at Bret, etc.

This is one of those instances in which storylines mix with reality to the point that some fans have a difficult time telling the difference. Shawn Michaels was not legitimately attempting to be fired from the WWF to join his friends in WCW. However, IN STORYLINE Michaels was attempting to be fired from the WWF to join his friends in WCW. The entire D-Generation X gimmick was meant to blur lines and make fans think that Hunter and Shawn were being disrespectful pricks so that they could leave for what they perceived as greener pastures. It was a ridiculous concept for a storyline, because, if you go back and watch footage from the time, it was clear that 99% of the live audience had absolutely no clue what HBK and HHH were talking about when they were throwing out terms like "The Clique" and the "MSG Sendoff." Fortunately, they eventually moved away from that aspect of the characters and in to a feud with Owen Hart over the events that took place at Survivor Series 1997.

Long-time 411 reader JLAJRC wants to talk about a Japanese-WWF crossover:

Why were Tenryu and Kiteo chosen to beat Demolition at WM VII when they had several better options (Hart Foundation, Rockers, Power and Glory, Nasty Boys, and especially the LOD) to do the same thing? You would think it would be better to have an established team squash them instead of a pair of nobodies.

First of all, I would hardly call Genichiro Tenryu a "nobody." Granted, he may not have meant that much to the American fanbase at the time, but he is a bona fide legend in Japanese wrestling and was one of the biggest drawing cards in that country at the time that Wrestlemania VII was held in the United States. Koji Kitao was not quite the professional wrestling star that Tenryu was, but he bonded with Tenryu over the fact that they both had backgrounds in sumo wrestling, which resulted in Kitao becoming a favourite of the veteran.

In 1990, Tenryu left his home promotion All Japan Wrestling to become the top star of a startup company known as Super World Sports. SWS had major financial backing from a Japanese eyeglasses manufacturer, which is why it was immediately able to obtain the services of Tenryu and many other top Japanese stars. In addition to all of these coups, SWS entered in to an agreement with the World Wrestling Federation which would see the companies exchange talent and promote a series of interpromotional cards. For example, Hulk Hogan and Randy Savage regularly appeared on major SWS cards throughout 1991.

Essentially, that relationship was the reason that you saw Tenryu and Kitao wrestling Demolition at Wrestlemania VII. SWS was often allowing WWF talent to go over their wrestlers on SWS cards in Japan, so the WWF allowing the SWS team of Tenryu and Kitao to go over Demolition at WMVII was simply part of a fair exchange.

Mark K. wants to take me down to Rio.

We all know the story about when Vince Sr. broke away from the NWA and formed the WWWF in May 1963 and got Buddy Rodgers to be his Champion. To explain how Rodgers suddenly showed up in the WWWF with a Championship belt (he lost the NWA Championship to Lou Thesz in Toronto in Jan.1964), Vince and the WWWF concocted a story about Rodgers winning a "phantom" tournament in Rio de Janiero.

My question(s) is: Did Pat Patterson REALLY win the first Intercontinental Championship in Rio de Janiero or did the WWWF just make up another "phantom" tournament or match to explain the new Championship? If the tournament REALLY happened, who else was in it? Was it the only match on the card? What arena was it held in?

Basically I want to know, if you say "Yes. There was an Intercontinental Championship Tournament in Rio de Janeiro in 1979" How do you know for sure? Other than checking the listing on WWE.com?

There was absolutely no tournament to crown the first Intercontinental Champion, in Rio de Janeiro or anywhere else, for that matter. Unfortunately, as wrestling fans get younger and younger and most of them rely only on the WWE title histories for their information, the story gets accepted as true more and more frequently despite the fact that it is an utter fabrication. The editors of supposedly "independent" sources of information like Wikipedia's wrestling pages do not help matters, as they often accept WWE's version of WWE history as the gospel truth, even when credible non-WWE sources discredit the company's version of events.



Now, if we could only get this Trish and Hot Past Trish in the same ring…

And by ring I mean my-In the interests of good taste, the following has been edited for your wellbeing with a big mug of cider for afterwards.

Anyway, onto the first question!

A very drunk 'forum legend' Egomaniac247 asks me a question, without implying I'm racist.

you asshole tell me who the guy is on the cover of missy hyatts book okay Ask 411.

Well, here's the cover in question:



I emailed the publishers, but sadly did not get a reply. Anyone have an idea? He does look like a wrestler, but it's entirely possible he's just a model, in which case it's very unlikely to find out his name.

But I gotta ask, Ego, in that image, you're looking at the guy?

Last time I was here, Earthquake squashing Damien was brought up. I got a couple of questions on that, so let's cover them now, first from JLAJRC

What was the reason for the switch from Damian to Lucifer in the first place? Was Damian sick or dying at the time and needed a replacement? How are the snakes doing now?

Well, you're assuming that it was the same snake every time. Damien was almost exclusively a Burmese Python, but not the same Python. A snake handler would bring Jake a snake at the start of a tour, he'd take care of it for the few weeks, then hand it back at the end of the tour. Then, next tour, he'd get a snake again. While it's possible that the same snake might have played Damien on more than one occasion, Damien was still several different snakes.

Regardless, the switch seemed to have been done more to give Jake an excuse to carry around a much larger snake. Lucifer was played by a Reticulated Python, which was much larger. Large enough that they couldn't put it down to a growth spurt.

As for where the snakes are now, no idea. Given that snakes live for about 20-30 years in captivity, it's possible, though unlikely, that a Damien might still be around. Anyone seen him?

Gozzz has a follow-up comment.

First of all, I did not know about the bag switch, so thanks for that tidbit.

My question actually concerned the storyline itself, not it's delivery.

I still cannot believe that the WWE(F) got away with (or even attempted) an actual storyline where an animal was visually "killed" and this was seen by a live audience. This would be similar to if Boss Man had been actually seen killing Pepper and making food out of him in 1998. I have no problem with the angle personally, I just think of the protests, etc., that would happen if this ran today.

Well, at least the home viewers switched at the crucial moment to Sean Mooney, which is arguably a much worse sight, but anyway.

And yes, you'd be hard pressed to find anyone trying this today, given the rise of PETA and other such fringe groups. Even if they got the American Humane Association in, they'd be lynched. But at the time, it got past with little outcry, probably because of the slightly cartoonish way it was done (He sat down on it) and how it wasn't a visible, real snake.

Tazz, not THAT Tazz sadly, asks after Magnum TA.

Look forward to the column every Wednesday (helps pass time at work!).

Got some questions about Magnum T.A.----->>>

1. Is he REALLY married to Tully's EX?? If yes, then do Tully and
Magnum get along in real life? Any leftover beef there??

Magnum's kept his private life, well, private since his retirement. Everything I've read states that he is indeed married to Tully Blanchard's ex-wife. And I couldn't find any beef between them, current or past. Both are fairly solid Christians, and also it's hard to imagine in a way, but you REALLY have to trust someone to let them jam a wooden spike into your eye.

2. Is he actually a born-again like HBK? Wonder if they've ever had a match??

Yes, Magnum, like a lot of wrestlers from that era, is a Born Again Christian.

Now, given that the accident Magnum suffered was in 1986, and Shawn debuted in 1984, it's technically possible that a young Shawn Michaels might have wrestled in a squash match against Magnum. However, Magnum wrestled for Jim Crockett pretty much exclusively during those years, while Shawn was in Mid South and WCCW. So no, they never had a match,

3. Okay, an opinion question, How far do you think Magnum would've
went if not for the Porsche wreck??

Would Terry Allen have been the next Hulk Hogan? It's possible. Jim Crockett would have given it the old college try. Ron gave his (very slightly pessimistic) take a while back.

Magnum would have been world champ, no question. A success, probably. But beyond that… Maybe, maybe not. It's hard to say how well talented people can go, sometimes they go great, other times they get shoved to the side.

Here is some early Chet Lemon for your listening enjoyment.
Omnipresent Nash FTW~!

Daniel has some questions.

Hey man, great column. Definitely one of the best at 411. Question dealing with the HBK-Vader match at Summerslam 1996. I was watching this match on the "Greatest Wrestlers of the 90s" DVD and I saw a part of the match (before the HBK countout) where Vader is lying face up, HBK goes to the top rope to deliver the vintage flying elbow, but when Shawn he lands on his feet, bends over, seems to yell at Vader, and then stomps him. My observation is that Vader screwed up by NOT rolling over so that the HBK elbow would have missed, and so HBK let him have it verbally in the ring. Is that a correct observation?

Yes indeed, that is correct. Vader forgot the spot, HBK then threw a hissy fit mid-ring, mid-match.

Ok, yes, Shawn has every right to be annoyed when a spot doesn't work. But if a spot messes up, you cover up for it and go on (but NOT be redoing the damm thing). You don't throw a damm hissy fit. #9 on "Reasons Why The 1990's Shawn Michaels was a Douchebag".

Also, regarding the famous urban legend that before HBK went to go drop the belt to Austin at WM 14 that Taker had to pull him aside and basically "threaten" him to do the job and drop the belt...HBK denies this in his autobiography. Given HBK's character change since coming back to wrestling and the fact that he is brutally honest about his flaws and failings in the past, is it more likely that it is just an urban legend or are there other legitimate testimonies purporting that HBK was pulled aside by Taker?

Well, to play Devil's Advocate, he's hardly going to say "Yeah, I was a prima donna who didn't want to lose" in his book, not about such a huge match such as that. Would you want to publicly admit to wanting to derail the guy that saved the company?

Anyone who claims that this happened on the night of WM is lying, in that after the Rumble, even if Shawn didn't want to lose his back was so badly damaged he would never have tried to pull this. So, I don't think the details of it are true.

Although at some point after Survivor Series, I could easily see Shawn being told about the plans and him throwing a tantrum, only to be told off by Taker. Not saying it happened, but it's feasible. But until Taker does a shoot interview, we'll never know. And I expect to see that the day after the bombs fall.

On the McMahon DVD and other places it is said that McMahon didn't want people to know he was the boss but was only the announcer, but that the Montreal Screwjob revealed that he was the boss and thus the Mr. McMahon character was born. Yet, explicit references to "Mr. McMahon" as the boss gos as far back to JR's heel promo in late 1996. Then HBK would make references in his interviews throughout the year to McMahon as the boss. Bret Hart's "altercation" with McMahon before the 1997 Summerslam also point this out. So, do you know the absolute first time McMahon was referenced as the boss? Also, where were they ultimately going in late 1996 and through 1997 with Vince being more involved with the storyline...did they plan for him to go all out heel eventually (so that it just wasn't the Montreal incident that brought in his heel character)? Any help with these questions would be most appreciated. Keep up the phenomenal work that you do and the great service you provide for us fans.

Yeah, this is one of those retro-rebookings they did. After all, this was in 1996.



The earliest example of Vince McMahon playing the Mr. McMahon character was in 1993, during the ‘McMemphis' storyline where Vince feuded with Jerry Lawler in USWA.

On the May 29th, 1995 edition of Raw, Vince announced that WrestleMania: The Special would air the following Sunday night and said he was "proud as a peacock," which is alluding to the fact.

However, I believe I found the first ever reference to Vince being the boss, and it's not the 1997 Bret Hart promos.

On the November 20th 1995 edition of Raw, on the same night Owen Hart ‘Knocked Out' Shawn Michaels, this happened:

Savio Vega fought Skip (w/ Sunny) to a no contest when Diesel interrupted the match, attacking Skip on the floor, and cut a promo at ringside, saying that after losing the title the previous night he was happy he no longer had to be the corporate puppet Vince McMahon forced him to be during his title reign.

So, shockingly, Kevin Nash was the first to shoot, so to speak.

Jacob has questions on a similar vein, including the previous one. Following on…

2. After the screw job at Survivor Series were there ever plans for Vince to cut the "Bret Screwed Bret" interview, maybe wait a few weeks and when the heat died down to just go back to being a commentator, but when the evil Mr. McMahon character took off they just ran with it and left the announcing up to JR and King.

No, given that ‘Bret Screwed Bret' was as much in character as it was shoot. Once they let the cat out of the bag, as it were, there was no way to put it back in. Hell, at the time they had little long term planning given that the plans kept changing based on the world title, and if people would walk out or not. Vince McMahon the Commentator was dead the moment the bell was rung.

3. Do you think that Bret should have be suspicious that Vince decided to not commentate Survivor Series that night since he always did the PPVs at that time and instead chose to be at ringside during the main event? It seems like a red flag that something was up even though I guess Vince could have still had the time keeper ring the bell from the announce table.

Well Bret wasn't exactly in the most stable, calm frame of mind to begin with. And maybe you can argue it was a red flag, but given the chaos and re-booking that was going on, even without the Screwjob, you can see why Vince would be unable to commentate, he had to be backstage to handle everything.

But then again I think that the whole thing should have been avoided (even if that would have probably killed the WWF), so whatever.

Bash, apart from having a cool name, also has two questions.

1. I heard a rumor a little while back that the lead singer of the "DX Band" was actually Triple H's brother. Any truth to that?

Nope. Chris Warren, lead singer of the DX Band, singer of ‘No Chance In Hell' (Ironic that DX and Vince have the same singer for their music, huh?) and current lead singer of ‘Bro-Kin' is not, nor has he ever been, HHH's brother. HHH has a sister (hey guys trying to reprogram EWR: Why not use her for WWE Unsackable status?), but no brother.

2. What is with the WWE no longer announcing managers/valets when they accompany a wrestler to the ring? It seems like they haven't done that in years? Why? I don't recall ever hearing once that Mark Henry was being accompanied to the ring by Tony Atlas or that The Brian Kendrick was being accompaned to the ring by Ezekiel Jackson. When did this tradition end and why?

I was kinda thrown by this question, but I looked into it and yeah, they kinda have stopped doing this.

I can't pinpoint a date or match, but I wager that it happened in the past couple of years, when there were fewer and fewer valets and managers. Managers are currently out of vogue in WWE, and thus they don't warrant mentioning since they don't count. Certainly with the rise of the MMA style introductions, where for big matches you do the whole introduce them in the ring, referring to managers or valets is a little off-putting.

Anyone out there know a date/era?

Greg has a few questions.

1) Are there still memorial shows for fallen wrestlers? (Brian Pillman, Owen Hart, etc)

Not for them, no. Most of the time memorial shows run once, very rarely is it annual. And if it is an annual event, it only goes for a few years then stopes. Pillman got 4 years worth, and maybe having 17 matches on the card might have been overkill. The Ted Petty Invitational was to run this year again, but didn't with IWA-MS's closure.

Wrestling Memorials are important, and it's good to have them, but they're not meant to be permanent fixtures. Although when if/when Flair, Hogan or Vince dies, they might get a permanent one.

Heh, Vince dying, like that'll happen.

2) Was it true that Todd Gordon was letting some ECW members go to WCW and that Paul Heyman never had an idea? (He knew about it after it happened)

‘Letting' is the wrong word. ‘Helping to organise' is closer.

History lesson time, which is kinda the point of the whole column, but whatever. The following is the "accepted/WWE" truth. I'll explain that in a moment.

Tod Gordon was owner of Eastern Championship Wrestling, which was formerly Tri-State Wrestling Alliance before it was sold to Tod outright (he had been part owner prior). ECW was part of the NWA, it was the NWA territory of Pennsylvania, Maryland and Delaware, hence the original name.

Eddie Gilbert was booking for the company, and wrestling for them. But then Tod and Eddie fell out in late 1993, causing Eddie to leave the company. Tod, knowing that he wasn't a booker, brought in Paul Heyman to book the company.

Paul had lots of ideas, and Tod let him go for it, and so Paul began to move Eastern Championship Wrestling towards the direction we all know and love hate know. This included Shane Douglas tossing the NWA title belt down, turning the company into Extreme Championship Wrestling, so on and so forth.

1996, Tod Gordon sells ECW to Paul Heyman, fully. Paul was already 49% owner by this point in lieu of 2 and half years of back pay, and at this point he buys the company outright. Paul then turns around and hires Tod on as ECW Commissioner and Authority Figure.

A year later, mid-1997, a bunch of guys are thinking of jumping ship to WCW. Big names, Perry Saturn, Sabu, RVD, Sandman, Fonzie. Tod Gordon then got them together, and began to negotiate for a package deal on their behalf. All of them would come in as a group, and invade WCW. They had different reasons, but at the time, all wanted out. So Tod began to negotiate with Terry Taylor and through him Eric Bischoff. Bischoff wanted to negotiate with them individually, in order to avoid taking Sabu, but Tod insisted. Then Saturn cut a deal, jumped, and the thing fell apart, Heyman found out, and fired Tod.

Ok, that's the accepted version. But since then, Tod has claimed the whole thing was a giant work. "Forever Hardcore" claim this. But the official WWE one claims it's legit, and if it is a work then Tod was still sticking to the script in 2001.

So depending on who you believe, it is or isn't true.

3) When the turns happen (faces to heels, heels to faces), is there any wrestler that did not want to turn, despite the fans cheering for him and the bookers telling him that a turn is coming?

Oh lord.

Would people stop asking such open ended questions? They're impossible to answer.

OK, yes, lots of people have in the past not wanted to turn. Some people like being face or heel, and thus resist turning. HBK would be the modern example, how he really didn't want to be heel in his short run with Hogan, but Hulk insisted, so HBK tore him to shreds then overacted in the match itself.

Sting resisted his TNA heel runs, but got overruled, eventually. Most of the time it's people not wanting to be heel, wrestlers tend to be happier as faces than heels (although Randy Orton is an example of someone who prefers being a heel.

4) Who was the longest running face before they turned heel? I think it's a tie with Bret Hart and Hulk Hogan.

Bret Hart? 8 years depending on how you count it.

Hulk Hogan? 13 years, a long time to be sure, but not unbeatable.

But my pick for "major name that you've heard of that was a face for a long long time and then a heel, wrestling all the while" (thus avoiding the Ricky Steamboat cop out), is ‘Hacksaw' Jim Duggan. Duggan turned face in 1983, and didn't turn heel until 2000 and his joining of Team Canada, for a 17 year gap.

Bob Backlund does have that beaten with 21 year run as a face before he snapped so gloriously and became MR. Bob Backlund, but there was periods of retirement during this run, so your mileage may vary.

5) Who was the longest running heel before they turned face?

The Honky Tony Man. Turned heel in 1987, didn't turn face until 2008 and his feud with Santino, 21 years.

While the commentators get their panties all twisted in preparation of posting their picks for longest runs, let's move onto Chris.

Hey Matt! Nice work on the column!

Was it planned when Brock superplexed Big Show and the ring broke? I just watched the clip the other day and I can't seem to know if it was fake or not.



100% Worked my man. Earlier in the match, they move the ring steps to get them out of the way. Having seen how rings are put together, if a ring were to break, it wouldn't do it like that. This was during the Paul Heyman era, and given just how memorable a moment it is, he clearly was doing at least one thing right.

Rob asks a question with an obvious answer.

The Iron Sheik has become something of a hilarious/terrifying cult figure in his advanced years, amongst both indy wrestlers and with IWC. His RF Video interviews are very popular, and everytime someone is asked to tell a crazy story about wrestling, it invariably involves the Sheik. So my question is this, is there anyone on the independent circuit doing an impersonation gimmick based on the Sheik (ala Black Machismo/bWo)? And I don't mean his old Evil Iranian gimmick, I mean an impersonation of how incredibly insane and over the top he has become. Waddling to the ring, slapping his chest and yelling "you-no-good-mother-fucker-piece-of-shit!" and "I-fuck-you-with-my-little-finger!" then babbling incoherently.

Cuz if not...I might do it.

Well, yeah, there is. The Iron Sheik.

But if you mean someone impersonating him as opposed to his over the top act, no, that's a wide open field. Good luck with that.

My Damm Opinion

Sean takes issue with Ryan, hence the skip ahead.

Hey, this is a follow up for your substitute's answer on 9/9 and I want to hear your response. It was said that any top title in a company is a World title and that no "World title status" is granted. While it's true there is no criteria, that leads to a problem. There are plenty of indy wrestlers who hold top titles in their company but not a major one, but no one goes around calling them World Champion (e.g. Drake Younger, CZW champion). My question(s) is/are what are some general criteria fo how to recognize World Championships and how do you judge them?

Well, the companies involved might. The AWA, such as it is right now if they are not dead yet from WWE's legal action, calls/called their champ a World Champ. There's nothing to stop any company calling anyone a world champion, which is what Ryan said.

Now, there are belts that most people agree are ‘World' Titles, albeit for wildly different reasons. It used to be Pro Wrestling Illustrated set the criteria, but now there's no real criteria, at least none written down.

Basically, it boils down to just if it feels like a world title. Which I know is silly, but it's kinda the truth. Sure, you can come up with your own rules and regulations, but the next guy will disagree with you, and the third guy will disagree with both of you.

Generally, if the company involved is large enough that a ‘mark' in New York, London, Sydney and Brazil has heard of it, then their titles are ‘World' titles. So right now it's basically just the WWE Championship, the WWE World Heavyweight Championship and the TNA World Title, with the ECW Championship and ROH Titles on the borderline. After all, the WWE Title is on the most popular wrestler on the planet, the World title on the most hated, and the TNA on the ‘Best' wrestler. While the ECW title is on an IWC darling and the ROH one is on the #1 Draft Pick in the 411 Indy draft, hence borderline status.

If people are paying money to see the title get defended, if people care about who holds the title, and if a non-fan has heard of it, it's a World Title.

From hard to quantify to hard to read. I kid, I kid, Ian? (Yes, the first one's kinda fact, but screw it).

Hey matt i love the work you do!!

who decides who gets pryo?

Pyro is decided by the writers/bookers/those in charge. Wrestlers get input I'm sure, but it's more a choice for those in command. Although I wish someone would ask for pyro that doesn't produce so much damm smoke.

and i have a question for your opinion on...

1.) who do you think on the lower part of the card is going to be the next john cena or hhh?

WOO WOO WOO, You Know It!

Well, that's pushing it, but seriously, when Ryder's your best bet at the bottom of the card, there's problems somewhere in the production line.

2.) which wwe superstar would be better suited for tna and which tna wrestler would do better in wwe?

Burchill in TNA where he might get like attention and a push, Abyss in WWE, if only to force him to calm down and wrestle instead of relying on weapons.

How about you guys?

With that open ended question, I say goodbye for now, and remind you all that Norman Borlaug passed away a few days ago. A truly great man who will be sorely missed by those who know who he was.